how to get file size without downloading it in python requests

Question

surely you have used a download manager. they detect and show the length of the file without downloading it

I know i can do this:

import requests
resp = requests.get("https://Whereever.user.wants.com/THEFILE.zip")
print(f"your file has {resp.headers['content-length'] \ 1048576}.")
...

but get downloads the content (THEFILE). so i can tell use the length after download. how to do that before download in python?

Thanks for detailed-answer

Answer 1

Instead of using GET request, do HEAD request:

resp = requests.request('HEAD', "https://Whereever.user.wants.com/THEFILE.zip")

The HTTP HEAD method requests the headers that would be returned if the HEAD request's URL was instead requested with the HTTP GET method. In your case, where URL produces a large download, a HEAD request would read its Content-Length header to get the filesize without actually downloading the file.